Ending the corruption blight

'Serve the nation with honour and dignity.' These words from President Mahinda Rajapaksa to graduand Tax Assessor appointees of the Inland Revenue Department, need to be learnt and relearnt by all enjoying the trust of the public, besides the immediate audience.

If the public is being served, this must be done with utmost honesty and truthfulness and there could be no deviance into cheating, chicanery and embezzlement of the public coffers.

Unfortunately, not all public officials adhere to the timeless principles enunciated by the President. As a result, the country is treated to revolting scandals, such as the recent VAT scam at the Inland Revenue Department which stunned the entirety of Lanka's body politic by the magnitude of its criminality as well as its scope and scale.

The rapid spread of corruption in the body politic of this country is closely related to the rapid commercialization of our culture and its increasing integration into the global economy. Globalization seems to be here to stay and there is a certain inevitability about it but we could certainly strengthen our law and order machinery to contain the spread of the cancer which is corruption.

Now that no less a person than the President has spoken forthrightly on this subject, we call on the law enforcers as well as the judicial system to tighten the screws on the systemic defects in the financial world, to enable the corrupt to be taken to justice more swiftly and effectively.

It cannot be emphasized enough that financial corruption is spreading rapidly on account of the tardy enforcement of the law and the lengthy delays involved in prosecuting and punishing the corrupt. So monumental and surreptitious is the spread of corruption that even some foremost position holders in the public service have been arraigned in the courts of law on account of it.

Curiously, all systems concerned seem to be operating tardily and half-heartedly on the question of arresting corruption and the principal miscreants in this ugly business seem to be making most out of these systemic defects and drawbacks.

Therefore, corruption presents a compounded crisis. We call on the decision-makers and policy planners to study this grave distortion very closely and to take the necessary remedial measures swiftly and rigorously.

We remind them that no quarter could be given to the corrupt. As for expanding our tax net, the President could be said to have hit the nail on the head when he said that it is mostly the less better off who pay taxes.

The so-called super rich, somehow, go scot free and lead scandalously ostentatious lives, may be with ill-gotten gains.

This is an ugly anomaly that needs to be put right and we hope our young and expanding ranks of Tax Assessors would be equal to the task.

It is true that some spoilt but raving "brats" from affluent homes and families spend tens of thousands of rupees on entertainment in a single night, while very many public servants eke out a painful existence on a measly salary.

The Inland Revenue Department would need to collaborate with the law enforcers and other relevant authorities to launch a combined effort to end such profusely bleeding ulcers in our polity.

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